Passover is my favorite holiday. It’s like spring break for me. I love cooking, I love pulling out recipes we only make once a year, I love the planning, i just love Passover!
Passover is funny, because every family has their own traditions, what rules they will bend, what rules they ignore, and what rules they won’t ever break, no matter what. Depending on how observant you are, and what your families traditions are, some rules are “rules”, others are “traditions”, others are “guidelines”.
The traditions I grew up with were “don’t be obvious or blatant that you are breaking Passover”. I use store bought mayonnaise. I use powdered sugar which usually contains a small quantity of corn starch. I use ketchup, which very likely contains corn syrup. We have Pepsi in the house, also usually with corn syrup. I use plenty of store bought stuff that surely contains forbidden ingredients, but isn’t walking around screaming “Look at me! I’m full of stuff you’re not supposed to eat!”. I categorize all that stuff as “not blatant”. I’m sure some Jews are reading this right now and clutching their pearls. That’s cool. Like I said, every family’s traditions are different.
Last year, a rabbinic ruling came out stating that “kitniyot” (beans, rice, a bunch of other previously forbidden stuff), was now okay to eat. So I can have corn tortillas and beans and rice for Passover? So, here’s the thing. I eat a mostly gluten free diet as it is. If beans, rice, corn, etc are OK for Passover, how is this week any different from the rest of the year? what, i don’t eat oatmeal for one whole week? I like the specialness of Passover. I appreciate the extra meal planning. It’s spring break from junk food, in a way. All that to say that I’m not ready to start blatantly eating kitniyot. Next year at Taco Bell?
anyways, here is an incomplete list of all the delicious things I’ll be stuffing into my face during Passover, because getting to eat all this delicious stuff qualifies as a holiday!
meatballs (omg, so many meatballs!)
schnitzel with lemon caper sauce
egg salad
carrot and olive salad
frittata with home made fermented pepper sauce
smashed potatoes with leek sauce
Citrus chicken
Potato Skins
Zucchini Gratin
flax crackers
Matzah bark
chocolate truffles
chocolate walnut cookies
almond cookies
Rainbow Chard with Ginger
Cardamom Apple Cake
Spinach and Cheese Dumplings
Sweet potato and Apple casserole
Sweet potato, pear, and pecan casserole
fruit and nut stuffed turkey
Matzoh Ball Soup
Turkey Burgers
Pickled Onions